


Genius, Sidekick, Madgod, Dwarf

by NorroenDyrd



Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls Online
Genre: Daedric Princes, Dungeon, Dwemer Ruins, Exploration, Gen, Magic, Non-Canon Vestige, Sibling Bonding, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-10 04:47:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15942089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorroenDyrd/pseuds/NorroenDyrd
Summary: While delving into a Dwemer ruin, Kireth and Raynor Vanos stumble upon some curious magic that turns out to be Sheogorath sending back an atypically artistically inclined Dwemer that once took a lengthy 'vacation' in the Shivering Isles to escape her tech-minded relatives. But, being Sheogorath, he of course makes a point of returning her to Tamriel only after the rest of her kin is long-gone.





	Genius, Sidekick, Madgod, Dwarf

**Author's Note:**

> I am marking this as Multiple Chapters just in case, even though I doubt that the concept will prove interesting enough for readers to request, or me to produce, a continuation.

Impatiently tucking away a strand of chestnut hair, Kireth flexes her shoulders and slips the long, crooked scrap of metal underneath the tightly fitted lid that covers the jutting pipe stub, in a motion practiced so often that it has almost become as mechanical as the rolls, clicks and teotchrs of the automata endlessly circling these murky stone mazes, which eat through the base of Skyrim's mountains like ant paths eat through old rotting wood.  
  
And speaking of pesky ants. The lid shifts to the side with a screeching grind sooner after Kireth flings all of her weight against the makeshift lever, growing red in the face (well, muddy reddish-grey more like) and thinking to herself that if all this exertion leads to her slaughterfish days beginning sooner this month, she will punch her useless wannabe excavation boss of a brother so hard his silly face will turn into a squished dumpling. But instead of revealing the hidden cache of Dwemer treasure, as the very same useless brother swore it would, the pipe grows so hot that it scalds Kireth's legs, even through the armour (probably because this supposedly 'fine netch leather dungeon-delving ensemble' came at a huge discount and is actually about as fine as the lining of Kireth's and Useless Brother Raynor's moth-eaten coin purses).  
  
She leaps back, cursing, while the pipe releases a dense, milky jet of steam, flashes of purple light piercing its swirly underbelly like lightning bolts would pierce a storm cloud. Kireth knows what it means: all the other pipes Raynor has had her poke acted the same. These lightning-like energy discharges come from a swarm of pesky metal critters, which soon come into view as the steam rolls back. Joints rattling, spindly metal legs knocking together, they point themselves at Kireth, lifting themselves up in a swaying dance the way actual spiders would. She backs away, eyes narrowed, her mind straining like fabric that's about to tear, under the pressing weight of frantic calculations (how many of these things will she take out if she swings a knife at them? kicks them? yanks out a piece of that unsteady-looking pillar to her left and collapses it on top of the swarm?).   
  
But before she can put any of her brilliant plans into action, another, even brighter bolt of purple comes zigzagging from behind the corner that she recently turned, hitting right in the centre of the carved floor slab where the spiders are skittering.  Where the electrifying energy splashes against the floor, a whole fountain of searing purple sparks ripples upward, raining down upon the spiders. The light cloaks each of them for a few seconds with a faint 'Bzzt' - and then, after a bit of convulsive jerking and mindless spinning on the spot, the metal critters are left blackened and silent and sprawled in half-molten mounds of debris across the floor.  
  
The purple energy simmers off to nothing, and Kireth turns around to find Raynor (no longer quite so useless, she admits) peeking tentatively from behind another pillar, all carved frowning Dwemer faces stacked on top one another. There is one of those fork-like automaton control rods clasped in his hand, and he waves it with the delight of a Nord child that has received a honey-nut treat.  
  
'I think I have gotten it to work! I always knew I was a genius!' he announces, stepping out into the corridor... But hardly do the words leave his mouth, when the rob begins to vibrate, with the same 'Bzzt' as the spiders did, and, streaks of burning purple beginning to course along its shaft, lurches itself out of Raynor's grasp, slaps one of the carved Dwemer across the nose, and rolls down to the floor.   
  
'Yeah, right, some genius,' Kireth sighs, rolling her eyes. 'Can't even get us accepted into the Academy at Shad-Astula!'  
  
Raynor waddles up to her sheepishly and pulls at his hair, which is at least a finger longer than his sister's.  
  
'At least... At least you are all right. I was getting so worried. Because, uh...'  
  
He hastens to straighten himself up and assume what he believes to be a majestic sage air, flipping his hair back and resting one hand, slightly limp-wristed, on his chest.  
  
'What would I do without my practical-minded sidekick?'  
  
Kireth snorts, not too irascibly, and ruffles her brother's hair.  
  
'Well, this sidekick will kick your side if we don't take at least something useful out of this ruin. How about you check that manuscript of yours? All the pipes around here seem to be nothing but spider-filled traps; which is kind of not the same thing as the mystical arcane treasure of the lost Dwarves that will make the Academy take us seriously'.  
  
Raynor, rather huffed over getting his perfectly combed-down hairstyle ruined, obeys nonetheless, diving into the satchel attached to his robe's belt and pulling out a yellowish, seemingly half chewed-up stack of scribble-covered pages.  
  
'I don't understand,' he says, his eyebrows crawling up. 'There should have been treas... Wait, what's that?'  
  
He cuts himself off and swats at the top page, making a small insect, which was sitting there with its intricate colourful wings spread out to obscure the words, take off in a spiralling flight towards the ceiling.  
  
'A butterfly,' Kireth shrugs. 'Must have crawled into your papers while we were still outside'.  
  
'But outside is one of the coldest regions of Skyrim!' Raynor protests. 'There shouldn't be any butterflies!'  
  
'Huh, genius, looks like you are right for once,' Kireth breathes out, her tone abruptly changing and her eyes turning to wonder-filled ruby orbs as she gapes somewhere past her brother.   
  
He follows the same direction with his own gaze - and gasps in astonishment. There is no longer one butterfly flitting over their heads. There are dozens of them. Vibrant, with their wings coated in a glimmering iridescent sheen and ending in the most elaborate of curls and lacy twists like ornamental paper cutouts, they weave themselves out of thin air, more and more joining the fluttering, rainbow-shaded cloud by the second.  
  
The cloud swells and spreads and shifts above the titled-back heads of the two gawking Dunmer. Filing up with its own inner pulsing light that dances off the butterfly wings and casts stained-glass-like reflections on the grey carved walls, it appears so out of place in the bowels of an abandoned, automata-infested structure, where there is so little organic life... Save for pale, wobbly mushrooms that melt into gooey jelly if you detach them from the rock to which they cling, and the long-bodied jet-black bugs the size of a well-fed guar, which can sometimes be heard skittering even deeper in, beyond the reach of the artificial light fired up by the Dwemer all these centuries ago, and are rumoured to be herded by grotesque, malicious, eyeless elves with see-through slimy skin and the faces of slaughterfish.  
  
Perhaps... Perhaps, pretty as they are, these butterflies are also the heralds of something dark, something unnatural, something that would be happy to lure in two adventurer morsels, and then descend in a ravenous, unstoppable hurricane that would leave behind nothing but clean-picked bones.  
  
'Ey, genius,' Kireth whispers to her brother, stretching out her arm between him and the butterflies. 'I say we... retreat'.  
  
Raynor opens his mouth - but whatever he may have had to say is drowned out by another, completely alien voice, disembodied yet powerful enough to fill the entire ruin with a shrill, bouncing echo,  
  
'Well then, you wanted to go home, little dwarfling? You got bored with me wonderful Isles, with all the exploring and arting and eyeball-juggling I had to offer? You whined about returning to your stuffy old family; the same family that once cast you out, for not wanting to build your funny clunky metal toys? For not enjoying your logic and mathematics and tax returns? You began to miss your home? Eh? Eh? All right then! Here you are! Home! Smack-dab in the middle of it! Ta-ta! Don't try to pester your Uncle Sheo again, you ungrateful beard-braider!'  
  
The last ripples of the voice ricochet wildly off the stone (and off the inside of Kireth and Raynor's own skulls), and when it's quiet enough to think, the two Dunmer realize that the contours of the butterfly cloud have become rather... person-shaped.  
  
The siblings exchange confused blinks, Kireth still standing with her arm put protectively in front of Raynor. So, the butterflies are a bad omen, after all. Uncle Sheo has to be Sheogorath, the god of madness, one of the Four Corners of the House of troubles - and it does not take a self-proclaimed genius like Raynor to be wary of the likes of him.  
  
'All right...' Kireth says through her teeth, as the person cloud floats lower and lower. 'Whatever he says to you about me... You know I love you, right? Please remember that if he tries to turn us against one another... Or to make us forget who we are... Please remember that, won't you, you smug little netch fart?'  
  
'I will, you nagging little scrib bite,' Raynor responds shakily. 'I love you too'.  
  
But much as they brace themselves for having to fight Sheogorath's trickery, when the person cloud's feet touch the floor, and the rainbow coat of butterflies is stripped off, magically melting into a cluster of soapy bubbles that then burst with a series of soft pops, the figure trapped underneath is revealed to be... Probably not Sheogorath. At least, not the usual manifestation that books on the varieties of Daedra warn against.  
  
Albeit clothed in precisely the sort of parrot-bright, asymmetrical garments that the Madgod himself would wear, the person from the cloud appears to be a woman. A female mer, in fact, if the amber eye tint and pointy ear shape is any indication. She is rather tall, curvy, and broad-thighed, with wiry brown hair and skin about the same dark-gold colour as the heavy jewellery she is wearing, which makes a clear, sad jangle as she turns her head about in confusion that rapidly gives way to wide-eyed, heartbroken denial.  
  
'No, no!' she screams, staggering forward without registering Kireth and Raynor's presence and plastering her bejeweled hands against the half-cracked pillar that Kireth was planning to squash the spiders with. 'This is not right! Why is everything so... broken? Where is everyone?'  
  
'You... You don't think she is actually a Dwemer, is she?' Raynor mouths to Kireth, with tiny sparkles of excitement almost literally manifesting themselves in his eyes as he watches the woman stumble about, tripping over her carnival dress and calling out names that bounce off her tongue with a rather admirable ease, considering how many consonants they contain. As her cries (pleas to family members, perhaps) are met with nothing but silence, she freezes up, eyes vacant and swimming with tears that make her glitter-rich makeup streak - and she just happens to do that against the background of the face pillar, which makes it evident how similar her heavily chiselled features are to the ones struck into the stone. And since she is now closer to a source of light, it highlights the slight stubble on her face; another hint that she might be Dwemer, for these mer were always depicted with beards regardless of gender.   
  
'From what Sheogorath said...' Raynor goes on, breathless and fidgety with excitement. 'I think I can deduce that he took her to the Shivering Isles... And only brought her back after the rest of her people were gone... That could be possible, considering that time is supposed to pass differently in Daedric realms... Oh... Oh, I wonder how much of her mind was left intact by this experience... I wonder if we can study her? Or bring her to Shad-Astula as proof of our competence?'  
  
His voice begins to rise in pitch with every new gushing sentence - but the loudest, and sharpest, sound he makes is when Kireth steps on his foot.  
  
'You can't just take her to Shad-Astula like that!' she hisses. 'She's a person, not a box of soul gems!'  
  
It is at this point that the Dwemer (if she even is a Dwemer; facial resemblance is well and good, but she is awfully tall for someone from a race known as Dwarves... But then again, that nickname was supposedly given to the mer of the deep by giants) finally becomes aware that she is bring watched. By two pairs of burning red eyes set on faces the colour of ash.  
  
'Daedra!' she spits, clenching her fists and rolling up her sleeves to reveal that her arms are tattooed from the wrist upward, with complex abstract patterns traced in gilded ink. 'More bloody Daedra! Did you do this? Did you turn my home into a ruin?!'  
  
'We are Chimer actually!' Raynor squeaks, with adding in a giddy, giggling half-whisper,  
  
'Oh by the Three, I am being spoken to by an actual Dwemer!'  
  
'You are being threatened by a Dwemer,' Kireth corrects him, with a small slap on the back of the head. 'But yes... uh... sera... We are Chimer. Or... Or their descendants. This is what our people look like now. Things have... uh... changed a bit'.  
  
The woman sways back, clutching her chest; Raynor mirrors her motion, evidently too overcome by this improbable conversation.  
  
Kireth inhales deeply. This is going to take a while.


End file.
